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Peninsula on Sunday 15 July successfully defended its narrow win last year in the 2018 Sydney North Interclub Pairs Challenge. We entered a full contingent in this great day played at our club - brilliantly convened by Cassandra Mitchell and supported by the generous culinary offerings of our members.
You can see the photos of the day mainly taken by Heidi Colenbrander.
The event's 58 pairs were divided by average masterpoints into three playing fields of ten, nine and ten tables. And each of these fields was divided further into two categories for the purpose of awarding points towards the pair's club.
President Sarah Young thanked Councillor Cory Amon during his recent visit to the club to see the portable PA system that his grant to the club procured for us.
The PA system will be used when we need a microphone in operation but not through the speakers that operate throughout the clubhouse. This occurs when we use another room or if we have a session or lesson operating only at one end of the room with something different happening at the other end.
Nineteen and a half tables contested the Lawrence Shield on Saturday 2 June, commemorating the huge contributions made by Verl and John Lawrence. Most of us will know Verl, and know of her past role as Chief Director. Sue Riley was able to share her former life covering many of the key roles of the club including Secretary and Masterpoint Secretary. She also shared information about John, one of Sue's former bridge partners, and a long time House Manager for the club. It was a great opportunity to learn of the significant work that Verl and John had volunteered to undertake to help make the club as good as it is today.
On this wild, wet and windy Saturday we played as one field, using an Arrow-Switched Web Mitchell movement to ensure that we all played the same 27 boards, a fair outcome not always achieved in large fields.
The winners were David Farmer and Catherine Whiddon, with runners-up Peter Clarke and Jim Rothwell who finished ahead of Chis Duggin and Lori Neville.
A number of members have raised the ongoing car parking issues at the club, particularly for those who are mobility challenged. While there is no simple solution the committee has:
- Asked council to provide more mobility access parking spaces in the Nelson Heather Centre carpark and to restrict more of Boondah Rd parking to five hours (rather than all-day that suits B-Line commuters)
- Publicized the KEO-RIDE option for those living north of Narrabeen bridge that can help reduce the number of cars coming to the Club
- Progressed plans to spread our heaviest player (and thus parking) loads by adding additional rookie sections to other afternoon sessions and by trialing a morning session
- Created a Parking Working Group (led by committee member Greg Hay) to work on a wide range of measures to improve our parking experience
If you are interested in being involved in the Working Group please contact Greg on 0421 659 761 or
Of course any shared transport to the club such as car-pooling, or sharing a taxi or Uber, would also help the situation.
It currently seems likely we will reach a significant annual revenue milestone at the very beginning of next financial year, if not at the end of our current financial year. When "total revenue as recorded in the income and expenditure statement (i.e. gross receipts) for a financial year is more than $250,000 (excluding GST) or current assets are more than $500,000" we become a Tier 1 incorporated association - and this has some significant impacts on our financial and regulatory reporting requirements.
In brief we will need:
- To demonstrate our accounting practices align with relevant Australian Accounting Standards
- To have our financial statements and supporting records independently audited.
You can read about the Tier 1 status and accompanying requirements on the NSW Department of Fair Trading website.
To ensure we are prepared for this transition the Committee is moving to obtain an independent review of our accounting practices and related advice from an appropriate accounting and auditing firm in time to put any changes in place before the next financial year.
Many Peninsula pairs played in the State Mixed Pairs Championship on the weekend of 26-27 May, with Margaret and Michael Draper the most successful. Margaret and Michael, who were representing Manly Leagues Bridge Club, were 6th in the North-South field at the end of the Qualifying round and so earned a place in the 7 table finals. In the Finals they were placed a creditable 12th, with two pairs tying for first place: Kevin ROSENBERG - Susan HUMPHRIES and Warren LAZER - Pauline GUMBY. Some of us will remember Susan Humphries tag teaming with Liam Milne as our Swiss Pairs experts on Tue 22 May.
Other Peninsula members who made the top 20 in each direction in the qualifying event included:
Fourteen teams fought it out over three weeks in this qualifying event for the State Open Teams championship. Congratulations to the Farmer team (Alan Davies, Vivien Eldridge, David Farmer and Catherine Whiddon) for winning, ahead of the runners-up Draper team.
Difficulties of a technical nature prevented the final round results from the State Open Teams qualifier on Thursday 24 May appearing on our normal website display or via Pianola. Consequently we have taken a scan image of the printed results for you to see.
The event was directed by Brian Soutter.
In the third week of May the President spoke to members about where we were in our research into suitable premises options for when our current lease expires in April 2021, and about priorities the Committee had unanimously determined to ensure the club was in a financially better shape in order to increase confidence of achieving a good premises outcome.
The Committee has set a goal of extending our current reserves of about $350,000 to more than $500,000 when our lease expires in under three years, without compromising the quality of bridge that we enjoy. To achieve this our intent is to increase our normal annual increase in our reserves from its recent levels of around $10,000 to more like $40-50,000 each year by reviewing our costs and, if possible, identifying new income sources such as fundraising and sponsorship of events or other costs.
